I was asked to face paint for a Friday night disco, which had jungle themed fancy dress. I can’t say no to a good spot of face painting, I love it, so off I trotted to The Moon Club here in the fine city of Cardiff. The main band Afriquoi had some funky beats, so I left my painting station and had a good boogie. The hosts and all the guests were inventively dressed, delightful and jolly good fun. A pleasure to be part of it.
Above is the poster with some retro comic book illustrations, I have now grown fond of. I took a copy home for a souvenir. Unfortunately I didn’t design it. I did do these though – here are a few of my new face paint designs which I created over the evening.
The idea of painting faces to match peoples outfits started from moment go. To the left is the hostess with a leopard and bird style face mask. To the right her mum, who was the first recipient of the popular one eye motif, with a leopard print pattern to match her top. I used lots of gold paint and glitter on both of them, to get that party glitz and glamour.
They decorated and brought this really funky jungle-themed frame for people to have their photos taken in. There was an excellent photographer, Tom Lia, who was a friend of the organiser’s there for the evening. He was dressed as a polar bear and took some fabulous photos, like the one above which he shared and let me use. Thanks Tom! The two lion faces above complemented their fabulous costumes. Dressing up as a pair or with groups of friends rock.
I found the general idea of the panda face online in advance. I then persuaded this lovely lady to be a panda for the evening, so I could have a go at some new designs. It is such a cute design, can’t wait to do this on little people, they will look very sweet.
Here I am on the left as a lizard, a bit evil looking though. I let my friend paint my face (white snow leopard lady in the middle), she had not done any face painting before and did a fabulous job. She toned down the evil lizard look with lots of gold glitter highlights.
A variation on the one eye leopard motif but this time a snow leopard, to match her groovy animal print top. I always get asked to do face painting that is not a full face, and any combination of patterns and decorations around one eye is perfect. They always leave as happy customers and don’t feel too covered in paint.
Another one eye motif with feathers to match a parrot top she was wearing. I got to use my metallic green paint in a pretty way (not a lizard or witch) which always brings life to a design.
The classic tiger face. I love doing this design, it is so quick and easy and always turns out looking special. I think this is due to using a big brush with fluid strokes to make the stripes. Freehand style face painting, making use of the brush strokes is fast and effective. More tigers the better I say, both as face paint designs and real ones in the wild.
I had a great night, made my beer money for the evening and also enough to buy a few new coloured face paints for the next event I do. Money is not important to me at all but the happy smiles of the peoples faces I paint is. I usually only face paint for charity (Sustrans and The Safe Foundation recently) or if asked nicely for a fun event. I appreciate getting the chance to paint and be creative for a purpose.
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excellent work young Jen